E 

























^ ^ .^-^ ;;,y:;;jssxs;^^^^>^.::5!«*?;.c^. 






■■«--?S^5^^ 










Glass E^o^ 
Book .^ni 



PRESENTED BY 






i'lKs^-' 



? Kl 



^%l^^^': 



,.%#^V 






si^fe'^,- 












■^-s. fza^ 









'55 *^ ^^ 'c 



rvir 



A BRIEF HISTORY 



FLAGS and BANNERS 



Pennsylvania Society 
of Sons of the Revolution 



PREPARED BY 

Captain Henry Hobart Bellas, U. S. A. 

Chairman of the Committee on Flags. 

Published by the Society 



PHILADELPHIA, PA. 
1903 



Committee on Flags 



Captain Henry Hobart Bellas, U. S. A., Chairman 



Thomas Hewson Bradford, M. D. 
James Hunter Ewing 

Frank Hutchinson Galloncy 

George Cuthbert Gillespie 
Jennings Hood 

William Macpherson Hornor 
Walter Horstmann 

Albert Kelsey 

John Selby Martin 

Lawrence Taylor Paul 

Ogden Dungan Wilkinson 
Charles Williams 



Author. 



\^' 



S^ 



INDEX 



1. United States National Standard e 

2. Flag of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania 9 

3. Standard of the Society of Sons of the Revolution . . 10 

4. First National Flag of the United States u 

5. Continental or Grand Union Flag n 

6. Flag of the Floating Batteries 1 1 

7. Crescent Flag of Fort Sullivan, S. C I2 

8. Rattlesnake Flag 

9. Flag of the Continental Navy 13 

10. Naval Privateer Flag 

11. Flag of the First Pennsylvania Regiment 14 

12. Flag of the Hanover Associators, Lancaster County, Penna. 14 

13. Flag of the Independent Battalion, Westmoreland County, 

Penna 

14. Royal (or Bourbon) Flag of France 15 

15. Count Pulaski's Banner j- 

16. Flag of the Commander-in-Chief's Guard 16 

17. Banner of the Washington Arms I7 



THE FLAGS AND BANNERS 

OF THE 

Pennsylvania Society of Sons of the Revolution 



The flags of the Pennsylvania Society of Sons of the Revo- 
lution are authentic facsimiles of those used during the Ameri- 
can Revolution, and are made only after a careful historical 
investigation by the Society's foregoing-named Committee and 
under its personal supervision. This Committee was instituted 
by a resolution of the Board of Managers of the Society, on 
January 9, 1893, ^^^ has had made for the Society's use to the 
present time the following flags and banners, each year endeavor- 
ing to add to this already extremely valuable and unique col- 
lection of memorials of our country's early battlefields, that 
so materially helped to make us a nation. 

I. The present United States National Standard, 

THE STARS EMBROIDERED IN WHITE SILK. 

By reference to the recent official report of the United States 
War Department on the origin of the national flag, it is state'd 
therein that "the American Congress in session at Philadelphia, 
Penna., by its resolution of June 14, 1777, established a national 
flag for the United States of America." 

The resolution was as follows : 

"Resolved, That the flag of the thirteen United States be 
thirteen stripes, alternate red and white; that the union be 
thirteen stars, white in a blue field, representing a new con- 
stellation." 

Although nearly a year previous (July 4, 1776) these 
thirteen United States had been declared independent, this reso- 
lution is the first legislative action recorded relating to a national 
flag for the new sovereignty. 

(5) 



6 

The use of the thirteen stripes was not a new feature, as 
they had been already introduced (in alternate blue and white) 
in a standard of the Philadelphia Light Horse Troop, in the 
early part of 1775, and the same colors and form were after- 
wards (in 1783) adopted by the Society of the Cincinnati for 
its banner. 

The union flag of the thirteen united colonies moreover, 
raised at General Washington's headquarters at Cambridge, 
Mass., on January 2, 1776, had, as will be shown further on in 
a description of that flag, also the thirteen stripes just as they 
are to-day. There is no satisfactory evidence, however, that 
any flag bearing the union of the stars had been in public use 
before the resolution of Congress of June, 1777. 

It is not certainly known to whom the credit of designing 
the stars and stripes is due.* The credit of making the first flag 
is generally given to a Mrs. Betsy Ross, wife of John Ross, an 
upholsterer on Arch below Third Street, Philadelphia, and with 
which historic legend all Americans are familiar. 

Although the resolution establishing the flag was not offi- 
cially promulgated by the Secretary of Congress until Septem- 
ber 3, 1777, it seems well established that the stars and stripes 
were carried at the battle of the Brandywine, September 11, 
1777, and most probably also, as is claimed, at the affair at 
Cooch's Bridge in Delaware, eight days before, and thencefor- 
ward during all the battles of the Revolution. 

Soon after its adoption, the new flag was hoisted likewise 
on the naval vessels of the new United States. The ship " Ran- 
ger," bearing the stars and stripes and commanded by Captain 
John Paul Jones, arrived at a French port about December i, 
1777, and her flag there received (on February 14, 1778) the 
first salute ever paid to the American flag by foreign naval 
vessels. 

By reference again to the preceding quoted report of the 
War Department, we find the flag of the United States remained 
virtually unchanged for about eighteen years after its adoption. 
By this time two more States (Vermont and Kentucky) had 



•The popular and generally accepted statement that the design of the flag is an inten- 
tional copy of the family arms of the Washington family, may be open to argument. 



been admitted into the Union and on January 13, 1794. Con- 
gress enacted : 

"That from and after the first day of May, 1795, the flag of 
the United States be fifteen stripes, alternate red and white; that 
the union be fifteen stars, white in a blue field." 

This flag was the national banner from 1795 to 18 18, dur- 
ing which period occurred the war of 181 2 with Great Britain — 
our second war for independence as it has been justly styled — 
when there were eighteen States engaged in united defence of 
our country. 

By 1 81 8 five additional States (Tennessee, Ohio, Louisiana, 
Indiana and Mississippi) had been admitted into the Union, 
and consequently a further change in the flag seemed now to 
be required. 

The Committee of Naval Affairs of the House of Represent- 
atives requested the naval hero, Captain Samuel Chester Reid, 
of New York, and who was then in Washington City, to make a 
permanent design for the flag.* He presented accordingly two 
forms for the same, both bearing thirteen stripes, but one with 
the stars formed into one great star in the union, symbolizing 
the motto " E pluribus unum," for our vessels in the merchant 
service; the other with the stars in parallel rows for the halls 
of Congress and the other pubHc buildings, as well as for our 
ships of war. Congress approved of these designs finally, and 
after considerable discussion on the subject, the Act of April 4, 
18 18, was passed, which provided : 

ist. "That from and after the fourth day of July next, 
the flag of the United States be thirteen horizontal stripes, alter- 
nate red and white; that the union have twenty stars, white in 
a blue field." 

2d. "That on the admission of every new State into the 
Union, one star be added to the union of the flag and that such 
addition shall take effect on the fourth of July next succeeding 
such admission." 



* Captain Reid, in the War of 1812-14, had commanded the American brig, "General 
Armstrong," in the naval fight against three British war vessels in the harbor of Fayal, in 
the Azores, September 26 and 27, 1814, virtually winning there a signal victory (though 
he lost his own vessel), by the disabling of the enemy's squadron, which was part of the 
expedition against New Orleans, and so delaying Admiral Cochrane's fleet at Jamaica, that 
Louisiana was saved from British conquest, and General Jackson was enabled to gain his 
victory at New Orleans before the arrival of the enemy's strong reinforcements. 



8 

The first flag of this last adopted design was made by the 
wife of Captain Reid, assisted by other ladies, in New York City, 
and was first hoisted on the national Capitol building, April 13, 
1818. 

The present authorized arrangement of the stars in the 
union was finally settled by an order of the President (Monroe) 
through the Navy Board, dated September 15, 181 8. 

The return to the original thirteen stripes of the flag of 1777 
was due, in a great measure, no doubt, to a reverence for the flag 
of the Revolution, but it was also due to the fact that a further 
increase of the number of stripes would have made the width 
of the flag out of proportion to its length, unless the stripes were 
narrowed, and this would have impaired their distinctness when 
seen from a distance. 

No act has since been passed by Congress altering this 
feature of the flag — the thirteen stripes representing the num- 
ber of States that originally effected American independence, 
and the additional stars marking the newly-admitted States since 
then — and it is the same as first adopted, except as to the 
changes in the number of stars in the union, which have not, 
however, been always arranged, until recently, in both horizon- 
tal and vertical parallel rows. 

In the war with Mexico the national standard bore twenty 
nine stars ; during the late Civil War thirty-five, and since July 4, 
1876, when there were thirty-seven, the number has increased 
to forty-five at the present time. 

What additional number of stars will be added in the far- 
reaching future, with our constantly increasing ten-itories and 
possessions changed into possible Statehood, is a subject none 
can definitely solve to-day. 

The lines written by one of our country's best and most 
patriotic poets, Joseph Rodman Drake, may, however, be fit- 
tingly applied to this " Star- Spangled Banner," immortalized 
by Francis Scott Key, and which is also popularly designated 
to-day as "Old Glory" : 

" Flag of the free hearts' only home, 

By angel hands to valor given ; 
Thy stars have lit the welkin dome, 

And all thy hues were born in Heaven !" 



2. The Flag of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, bear- 
ing THE ARMS OF THE StATE, EMBROIDERED IN 
APPROPRIATE COLORS. 

As early as April, 1777, Pennsylvania currency was issued, 
upon which was engraved the arms of the Commonwealth ; there 
being, however, neither crest, supporters nor motto accompany- 
ing the same. The arms would seem to have been (in the 
opinion of the erudite and lamented William Henry Egle, 
M. D., former State Librarian and a Vice-President of the 
Pennsylvania Society of the Sons of the Revolution, 
at the time of his decease), a compilation of the Provincial 
seals of the three original counties; since we find, he states,* " as 
a crest surmounting the Penn coat-of-arms on that of Philadel- 
phia city and county in 1683, a ship under full sail; on the seal 
of Chester county, a plough; while on that of Bucks county 
was probably a sheaf of wheat." 

The seal of the city of Philadelphia, as early as 1701, had 
upon its quartered arms a sheaf of wheat and a ship under full 

sail. 

In 1778, we find in a "broadside" of the day, an engraving of 
the Commonwealth's arms, with the motto, "Virtue, Liberty 
and Independence;" the eagle as a crest, and the two capari- 
soned horses on either side for supporters. The State arms 
were first cut in printer's metal by Caleb Lownes, who was 
directed by the Supreme Executive Council on April 19, 1779, 
to be paid therefor. These arms and their surroundings of 
maize and the ohve branch, as well as the supporters, were 
changed in different parts and in colors, from time to time.t until, 
in 1874, a commission was appointed (under a joint resolution 

* See "The Arms of Pennsylvania and the Great Seal of the Commonwealth," by 
William H. Egle, M. D., State Librarian, Penna., State Library Appendix L. 

t On April 9, 1799, the State Legislature enacted that "There shall be two colors or 
standards provided at the expense of the State for every regiment, so that each battalion 
may have one." The resolution further provided that " On the fly of one of the said colors 
(to be made of a dark-blue colored silk) there shall be painted an American eagle with 
expanded wings, supporting the arms of the State, or some striking part thereof; m the 
upper comer next the staff shall be inserted in white letters and figures the number of the 
regiment and the word ' Pennsylvania,' encircled or ornamented with thirteen stars." 

Another joint resolution of the Legislature (of May 26, 1861), prescribed regulations 
for procuring regimental standards, with the arms of the Commonwealth thereon, for the 
Pennsylvania regiments then in service, and inscribing the flags with the regimental num- 
bers and the names of the actions in which the respective regiments had been distingushed 
in the then existing civil or in former wars. 



10 

of the General Assembly, approved April 30), "to correct the 
coat-of-arms of the Commonwealth from such errors or anoma- 
lies as may be therein discovered and to have the same recorded 
in the State Archives." This commission, however, unfortu- 
nately through its agents, transcended its authority and reported 
at the next General Assembly in March, 1875, the correct arms 
to be as they are shown to-day, adopting the representation by 
Caleb Lownes in 1778, which was the design of the veritable and 
original arms of the State. 

These arms are the same, excepting the supporters, which 
are also used on the obverse of the Great Seal of the Common- 
wealth, and as they now appear in their appropriate colors on 
the State flag of dark blue silk, may be described heraldically 
as follows : 

Party per fess or, azure and vert. On a chief of the first, 
a ship under full sail. On a fess, a plough proper. On a base 
of the second, three garbs or. 

Crest, an eagle rousant proper, on a wreath or and azure. 

Supporters, two horses sable, caparisoned for draught, 
rearing respectant. 

Motto, Virtue, Liberty and Independence. 

3. The Standard of the Society of Sons of the Revolution- 

The Society's flag, which was adopted by the Pennsylvania 
Society of Sons of the Revolution on March 9, 1891, from a 
design, furnished by one of its members, was also accepted by 
the General Society on April 4, of the same year, as the author- 
ized standard of the entire Society. This flag consists of two 
vertical buff stripes, each of equal width, with a broad dark blue 
stripe between, the latter bearing the insignium of the Society 
in gold.* 

The flag is made of both silk and bunting, for the use of the 
Society in its meetings and celebrations. 



* The Society's badge, or insignium, may be briefly described as follows: An oval 
medallion of gold, bearing in relief a Continental soldier in the field, with the figures 1775 
below; the medallion surrounded by a circle of dark blue enamel with escalloped edges of 
gold and bearing thereon thirteen gold stars of five points each; the whole surmounted by 
an eagle rising and with wings displayed, in gold. 



11 

4- The First National Flag of the United States. 

This flag consisted of thirteen alternate red and white stripes 
with thirteen stars in a circle on a blue canton in the upper 
right-hand corner.* The flag was adopted by resolution of the 
Continental Congress at Philadelphia, Penna., on June 14, 1777, 
and w^as first used in the engagement (it is claimed, and where 
a monument has been erected to commemorate the event) at 
Cooch's Bridge, below Wilmington, Delaware, September 3, and 
(it is known) at the battle on the Brandywine in Chester County, 
Penna., September 11, 1777. 

5. The Continental or Grand Union Flag. 

This flag, consisting of thirteen alternate red and white 
stripes (the same as its immediate successor, the first national 
flag of the United States just previously described), had, instead 
of the union with thirteen stars in the upper right-hand corner, 
the English "Jack", composed of the red and white crosses of 
St. George and St. Andrew on a blue field, as the canton. The 
flag was first unfurled at Cambridge, Mass., January i, 1776, 
on the organization of the new Continental army that had suc- 
ceeded the several State battalions in active service during the 
previous year. 

The American Congress had not, it must be remembered, 
yet declared the colonies "free and independent States," and 
even at this late day the Americans proffered their loyalty 
to British justice, if it were possible to still obtain their rights 
and liberties. Hence the retention of the British or Union 
"Jack," which was used on the Royal flag. 

6. The Flag of the Floating Batteries. 

In September, 1775, two strong floating batteries were 

launched on the Charles River, Mass., and in the following 

month opened fire on the enemy in Boston. Their ensign used 

was a pine tree flag.f The six schooners first commissioned by 

* The words, "upper right-hand comer," or "dexterside," are always used in the text 
heraldically and are to be construed, as to position, as if the "field" of the flag was reversed 
and placed in front of the body as a shield would be held. 

t Colonel Joseph Reed, in a letter from Cambridge, Mass., to Colonels Glover and 
Moylan, dated October 20, 1775, said, " Please to fix some particular color for a flag, and 
a signal, by which our vessels may know one another. What do you think of a flag with a 
white ground, a tree in the middle, the motto — 'Appeal to Heaven'.'' This is the flag of 
our floating batteries." 



12 

Washington in the same month to cruise in Massachusetts 
Bay and the first vessels commissioned soon afterwards by 
the Continental Congress, sailed under the same device — a 
green pine tree in the centre of a white field — with the motto: 
"Appeal to Heaven,"* and the floating batteries of the State 
of Pennsylvania in the Delaware River also carried this flag — 
a green pine tree in the centre of a white field — in the autumn 
of 1775, and likewise during the operations on that river in the 
defence of the city of Philadelphia in 1777 and 1778. 

7. The Crescent Flag of Fort Sullivan, S. C. 

The Crescent Flag used in the heroic defence of Fort Sulli- 
van (now Fort Moultrie, on Sullivan's Island, in Charleston 
Harbor) against the British in June 1776, by Colonel William 
Moultrie, was the first American flag used in the South in the 
Revolution. It consisted of a dark blue field with a white 
crescent in the upper right-hand (dexter) corner. 

Colonel, afterwards General Moultrie, states in his Memoirs 
that "as there was no national flag at the time, I was desired 
by the Council of Safety (on September 13, 1775, on taking 
possession of Fort Johnson, on James Island, in the harbor) to 
have one made; upon which, as the State troops were clothed 
in blue and the fort was garrisoned by the men of the first and 
second regiments who wore a silver crescent on the front of 
their caps, I had a large blue flag made with a crescent in the 
dexter corner to be uniform with the troops. This was the 
first American flag displayed in the South." 

It was this flag that the gallant Sergeant William Jasper, 
of South Carolina, in the attack on Fort Sullivan, the following 
summer, fastened upon a sponge-staff and replaced upon the 
bastion in the midst of a furious fire, after it had been shot away 
by the enemy's fleet and had fallen outside the parapet upon 
the beach. For his heroic act Governor Rutledge, the following 
day, presented him with his own sword, and thanking him in 



* The London Chronicle — an an ti -ministerial newspaper — in its issue for January, 
1776, states that an American provincial privateer had been captured and that its bunt- 
ing flag, then in the British Admiralty office, "consisted of a white field with a green pine- 
tree in the middle, and upon the opposite side the motto, 'Appeal to Heaven'." 



13 

the name of his country, tendered him an officer's commission 
which Jasper modestly decHned. 

8. The Rattlesnake Flag. 

This famous flag consists of thirteen horizontal alternate red 
and blue stripes — sometimes also alternate red and white 
stripes — bearing diagonally across them a rattlesnake in a 
moving or running position, with the threatening motto above 
or beneath, " Don't tread on me." 

The flag was used by different organizations of the Ameri- 
can army during the Revolution, but particularly by the vessels 
of the American navy, as stated by John Jay in a letter dated 
July, 1776. Captain John Paul Jones was supposed to have 
used this special device, though an English writer of the 
period of Jones' cruise in European waters (in 1779), is 
quoted as saying, "a strange flag has lately appeared in our 
seas, having a pine tree with the portraiture of a rattlesnake 
coiled up at its roots and with these daring words, ' Don't 
tread on me.' " This flag would seem to be almost the same as 
that designed by Colonel Gadsden, of South Carolina, in 1776, 
for "the Commander-in-Chief of the American Navy." [See 
No. 9.] 

The brave Captain Gustavus Conyngham, whose memory 
has been recently honored by this Society, also carried the 
rattlesnake flag at the masthead of his little vessels, the "Sur- 
prise" and "Revenge," in his continued successful attacks on 
British commerce in 1777 and the following years of the Revo- 
lution. 

9. The Flag of the Continental Navy. 
This flag, having a yellow field, with a green pine in the 
centre, and a rattlesnake coiled at its base, with the usual motto 
of "Don't tread on me," was originally designed and presented 
by Colonel Christopher Gadsden, of South Carolina, a member 
of the Marine Committee, to Congress on February 8, 1776, as a 
standard " to be used by the Commander-in-Chief of the Ameri- 
can Navy." Commodore Esek Hopkins, who during the Revo- 
lution held this rank in the navy — a relative position to that of 
Washington in the army — is said to have been the first naval 
commander that used this flag. 



14 

lo. Naval Privateer Flag used during the Revolution. 
This flag of thirteen alternate yellow and black stripes — 
sometimes varied by thirteen yellow and white stripes* — was 
used, according to Preble in his "History of the United States 
Flag," by Continental as well as by American privateer vessels. 
It was also often, probably, a decoy flag which had been used 
by some of the Continental cruisers in foreign ports. 

11. The Flag of the First Pennsylvania (Continental) 

Line Regiment. 

This standard had a deep green field with a crimson square in 
the centre, bearing on the square, as a device, a hunter in the 
attitude of striking a lion enclosed in a net, with a spear. The 
motto below is " Domari Nolo" (I refuse to be subjugated). The 
flag, described in a letter by Lieutenant-Colonel Hand to James 
Yeates, of Lancaster, Penna., dated Prospect Hill, March 8, 1776, 
was carried by the regiment through the Revolution in all its 
skirmishes and battles, from Boston, in 1775, to Yorktown in 
1 781 . It was with this regiment with Wayne in Georgia in 1782, 
and in camp on James Island, S. C, in 1783, when the news of 
peace reached there, and from whence the regiment embarked 
for Philadelphia soon afterward. 

The original flag is now in the State Library at Harrisburg. 

12. The Flag of the Hanover Associators of Lancaster 

County, Penna. 

A crimson flag, bearing as a device a rifleman in green hunt- 
ing shirt and buckskin leggings, standing on guard, with the 
motto, " Liberty or Death" underneath on a yellow scroll. 

The Hanover Associators (or Volunteers) originated at a 
meeting on June 4, 1774, of the inhabitants of Hanover, Lan- 
caster Co., Penna. Resolutions were there adopted, "That in 
the event of Great Britain attempting to force unjust laws upon 
us by the strength of arms, our cause we leave to Heaven and 
our rifles." The flag of the Hanover Riflemen was also adopted 
by the committee at the same time. 



* " In September, 1776, the Continental brig 'Reprisal,' 16 guns, commanded by 
Captain Lambert Wickes, while lying at Martinique, W. I., wore a flag of thirteen stripes, 
whose field was yellow and white." — Preble. 



15 

13- The Flag of the Independent Battalion, Westmore- 
land County, Penna. 

The flag was of crimson silk with the cross of St. George in 
the upper right-hand corner. In the centre of the field is a 
rattlesnake coiled, with head erect, in the attitude of striking 
and under it the motto so frequently used — "Don't tread on 
me." The letters above ("J. P." and "I. B. W. C. P.") indicate 
"Colonel John Procter's First Brigade, Westmoreland County, 
Pennsylvania." 

The flag was used by Colonel Procter's regiment through- 
out the war and was carried at Trenton, Princeton and in other 
battles. On Colonel Procter's death it passed to the next senior 
officer, and so on to the last survivor with whose family it re- 
mained. 

14. The Royal (or Bourbon) Flag of France. 
A white silk flag, the field sem^e (or covered) with fleurs- 
de-lis of gold and supposed to have been used by the French 
allied forces in the American Revolution.* 

15. Count Pulaski's Banner. 

A cavalry guidon of double crimson silk with the designs 
on each side handsomely embroidered in yellow silk, and the 
letters shaded with green. On the obverse side of the banner 
appears the "all-seeing Eye" within a circle of thirteen stars 
surrounded by the motto, " Non alius regit " (No other governs). 
On the reverse are the letters "U. S." encircled with the motto, 
"Unita virtus forcior " (Union makes valor stronger). 

This banner was made for and presented to the brave Count 
Pulaski by the Moravian nuns at Bethlehem, Penna., after he 
had raised and organized an independent corps of sixty-eight 
horse and two hundred foot at Baltimore, Md., in 1778. Pulaski 
received the banner gratefully and bore it gallantly through 
many battles until he fell at Savannah, Ga., in the autumn of 



* The correct arrangement of the fleurs-de-lis on this flag would appear, on historical 
investigation, to be open to doubt. The royal banner of France was originally, from 
the reign of Louis VII. (A. D. 1 137-1180), azure (blue) sem^e of fleurs-de-lis, and so con- 
tinued for several centuries. Charles V. (temp. A. D. 1365) reduced the number of 
fleurs-de-lis to three. The field was also afterwards changed from blue to white, and this 
was the royal color, with the three golden fleurs-de-lis — an heraldic anomaly — during the 
entire reign of the Bourbons. See Boutell's Heraldry. 



16 

1779- The banner was saved by his lieutenant — though him- 
self sorely wounded — and it eventually reached Baltimore 
after the close of the war, where it was used in the procession 
that welcomed La Fayette to that city, during his visit to this 
country in 1824, and was then deposited, first in Peale's Museum 
and afterwards with the Maryland Historical Society (in 1844), 
in whose rooms it is still carefully preserved. 

But little of its former beauty remains, the crimson silk 
being now faded to a dull brownish red. A deep green 
bullion fringe ornamented the edges of the banner which was 
attached to a lance when borne in the field. The size of the 
original flag is only twenty inches square. 

The presentation of the flag to Pulaski and the soldier's 
glorious death, are commemorated by the poet Longfellow in his 
stirring "Hymn of the Moravian Nuns," at the consecration of 
the banner.* 

16. The Flag of the Commander-in-Chief's Guard. 

This flag, frequently designated as that of "Washington's 
Life Guard " (which term was resolved by Congress on April 
IS' 1 777' to be a misnomer), originally consisted of white silk 
on which the following device was painted: One of the Guard 
was represented holding a caparisoned horse and in the act of 
receiving a banner or pennon from the Genius of Liberty, who 
was personified as a woman leaning upon the Union shield, 
near which is the American eagle. The figures stood upon a 
green ground and overhead on a ribbon was the motto of the 
corps, "Conquer or Die." The figure of the Guard was in the 
uniform adopted for the corps, a blue coat with white facings, 
white waistcoat and breeches, black half-gaiters, a cocked hat 
with a blue and white feather, and sword and cross belt. The 
female figure was robed in light blue. 

The original flag was owned by Mr. George Washington 
Parke Custis, the adopted son of General Washington, and was 
deposited by Mr. Custis in the Museum at Alexandria, Va., with 

* The word nun as applied to the Moravian sect has a different signification from that 
indicated in speaking of the female recluses of the Roman Catholic Church. In the former 
case it virtually meant only the single women or sisters of the Moravian colonists. The 
poem of Longfellow, unfortunately, contains several historical inaccuracies — possibly 
pardonable from the view of a poetical license. 



17 

many other valuable relics, including British flags captured at 
Trenton and at Yorktown, and one that belonged to Morgan's 
Rifle Corps. The entire collection was accidentally destroyed 
by fire at the burning of the museum several years after the 
close of the Civil War.* 

The Guard of the Commander-in-Chief was a distinct corps 
of superior men attached to his person, but never for this reason 
specially spared in battle. It was organized in 1776, soon after 
the siege of Boston and while the American army was en- 
camped on Manhattan Island, near New York City. It con- 
sisted of a battalion of one hundred and eighty men under the 
command of an officer with the rank of Captain-Commandant; 
care being always taken to have all the States, from which the 
Continental army was supplied with troops, represented in the 
corps. 

During the winter of 1779-80, however, when the American 
army under Washington was cantoned at Morristown, N. J., 
in close proximity to the enemy, the Guard was increased to two 
hundred and fifty men. It was reduced to its original number 
in the following spring, and early in 1783, the last year of its 
service, was again reduced to only sixty -four non-commissioned 
officers and privates, and under its new and final reorganization 
(on June 16, 1783), it consisted of but thirty-eight rank and file, 
twelve of whom were mounted. f The Guard was armed with 
muskets and occasionally carried side-arms. 

The organization was finally disbanded and mustered out 
of service on Constitution Island, opposite West Point, N. Y., 
December 23, 1783. 

17. Banner containing the Washington Arms. 

The arms of the Washington family may be heraldically 
described as follows : 

Argent, two bars gules, in chief three mullets of the second. 



* An accurate description of the flag given recently by an aged resident of Alexan- 
dria, Va., who had often seen it, corresponds exactly to that given by Lossing in his " Field 
Book of the Revolution." The flag was about two feet in length. 

t See Journal of Congress, October 6, 1783. Without doubt, the flag of the corps 
was used exclusively by the latter body, which escorted the baggage-wagons containing 
the personal effects of General Washington to Mount Vernon, under orders of Novem- 
ber 9, 1783. 



18 

Crest, An Eagle issuant, wings endorsed, sable, out of a 
ducal coronet or. 

Motto, Virtus sola nobilitas (Virtue the only nobility). 

These arms (of red stripes or bars and stars of the same 
color, on a white or silver shield), were used, not only by 
General Washington, but by preceding successive generations 
of the Washington family in both England and America, and 
were, without doubt, authentic ; the family having been distin- 
guished and frequently mentioned in the local histories of the 
mother-country. The same arms appear also in carvings in 
both the manor-house, which still exists, and the ancient parish 
church at Sulgrave, Northamptonshire, England.* 

* That General Washington — it may be added, however, in explanation of his use of 
family arms — was not a blinded believer in heraldic coats-of-arms as a mere evidence of 
aristocratic lineage, and for this sole reason retained their use, but on the contrary regarded 
and preserved them as a valuable historical adjunct to the record of a distinguished family, 
as they are properly so regarded by many others at this day, is evidenced by a letter written 
by him in 1 788 to a Mr. Barton on the subject, five years after the formation of the Society 
of the Cincinnati by the oflficers of the American army. 

"It is far from my design," he writes, "to intimate an opinion that heraldry, coat- 
armour, etc., might not be rendered conducive to public and private uses with us, or that 
they can have any tendency unfriendly to the purest spirit of republicanism. * * * 
While a certain portion of the community, probably from turbulent or sinister views, are 
clamorously endeavoring to propagate an idea that those whoin they wish invidiously to 
designate by the name of ' the well-bom,' are meditating to distinguish themselves from 
their compatriots and to wrest the dearest privileges from the bulk of the people, I think 
it impolitic to agitate any subject that may tend to promote these feelings * * * 

" I make these observations with the greater freedom, because I have once been a 
witness to what I conceived to have been a most unreasonable prejudice against an inno- 
cent institution — I mean the Society of the Cincinnati. I was conscious that my own pro- 
ceedings on the subject were immaculate. I was also convinced that the members, actu- 
ated by motives of sensibility, charity and patriotism, were doing a laudable thing in 
erecting that memorial of their common services, sufferings and friendships." 

See account of the Society of the Cincinnati, by Alexander Johnston, in Memoirs of 
the Historical Society of Pennsylvania, Vol. VI., Phila., 1858. 



AUG 13 1908 














■< 



T)li^'-:<r:\ 









1^' 

I 









■^'M^ 











'-ff-.il. 













jiiiiiiiiiftiiiiiii/iiiiiiiiiiiii/iiiiiiiiiiii.. 








